Jonathan Lloyd was a leader, a man with a killer instinct. He put up an astounding 15 assists to go with 23 points (making 14 free throws in the process) against Ole Miss. Lloyd is hugely improved from last year and has admirably filled in while Dominic Artis is suspended. This team does not lack point guard play. In fact, Oregon had 25 assists on their 38 made field goals and shot nearly 60% from the field. Those numbers say that the game was a blowout. But it took overtime for Oregon to get a 10 point win thanks to the leadership showed by Lloyd and Mike Moser—but a new problem reared its hideous head.
The Ducks played foul for long stretches of the game. Oregon committed far too many violations and allowed a number of layups. But while Marshall Henderson and Ole Miss threw haymakers with each three pointer, but Oregon was able to respond. This team has resiliency and a will to win.
However, in this game they showed an inability to focus and maintain composure, especially in the second half. Each time the Ducks took a slight lead they seemed to relax until someone—Moser with timely threes, Elgin Cook with hard-nosed drives, or Lloyd setting up or scoring—took charge again for a brief moment. While some individual players have that “let’s step on their throats” mentality, the team as a whole does not seem to possess a sense of the import of the moment. Richard Amardi earned a technical foul for slamming the ball on the court. Immediately, Cook and Lloyd got in his face, a signal of strong leadership but also one that shows not everyone has their emotions controlled. This is something to watch in the future where Oregon is, perhaps not struggling, but in a tight game against a better opponent than Ole Miss—will the team be able to handle the pressure?
Oregon certainly has a potent offense (5th highest on Kenpom) that is a threat to turn a close game into a blowout (the game against Pacific is a perfect example of this) but also possesses a porous defense (90th) that keeps other teams in the game. As of now, Oregon will have to rely on their offense to score at a brisk clip and hope their opponents are unable to keep up because of their poor defense. This was only reconfirmed against the Rebels—the caveat being that there are not many players in the country who can score 39 points in a game like Henderson. The Ducks showed their quality, but a conference or NCAAT game brings a very different type of pressure, and it will be interesting to see how they respond in a close road game in February.
But the Ducks did address their biggest problem so far this season with improved rebounding. Against the Rebels, they were only -2 on the boards. Rebounding is effort. By drawing nearly even on the boards, Oregon demonstrated a 1) focused attempt to block out and grab the ball and 2) a gritty desire to win the game. Clearly, Oregon can hold their own on the boards against bigger teams. However, they still gave up 15 offensive rebounds, leading to second-chance points (put-backs and kick-outs for Henderson threes) and a closer game than the Ducks would like. This does not really tell us anything we do not already know, but it simply reiterates that Oregon will have problems with Big Ten teams like Wisconsin and Michigan State as well as Pac-12 foe Arizona and their massive frontcourt.
Still, this is a team looking for cohesion, and one that is without Artis and Ben Carter. The former should help everywhere on the perimeter and the latter will shore up the post defense and provide a stabilizing rebounder when a critical board is needed. They will only get better. The game against Ole Miss showed that Oregon can battle it out on the boards without running out of energy and certainly does not lack the will or effort to do so, but it also revealed that the Ducks lack—right now—a unified finishing instinct from all the players on the floor.
Make no mistake, this was a good win for Oregon (115-105) and will prove invaluable when it comes time to go on the road in the Pac-12. For a first time trip outside Eugene with a vastly different team from last year, the Ducks performed very well in a very hostile environment.
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